The Cardinals fired Mike Matheny on Saturday night while he was in his seventh season as the team's manager. Hitting coach John Mabry and assistant hitting coach Bill Mueller have also been let go, and bench coach Mike Shildt will serve as interim manager for the time being.

Matheny's record as the 49th manager of the Cardinals is 591-473, ranking him 5th on the all-time list for the team. While the rosters have been very flawed, the Cardinals have been big disappointments over the last three seasons after making the playoffs in Matheny's first four seasons as manager (2012-15).

St. Louis has missed the playoffs the last two seasons and now sits seven games out of first place in the NL Central with a 47-46 record. The Cardinals have underperformed on offense and struggled in recent weeks amid reports of locker room discontent - primarily between struggling outfielder Dexter Fowler and Matheny. He led the Cards to four straight playoff appearances in his first four seasons, but his team's performance has fallen off since then. The Athletic also reported this week about a rocky relationship between veteran closer Bud Norris and rookie setup man Jordan Hicks.

Kind of disappointing from a Cubs fan perspective, as we all know that he was a bad manager and whatever talent the Cardinals have had has been wasted with Matheny in charge. He became a team leader playing for La Russa, who retired just days after leading the team to his second World Series title in 2011.

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